Interviews

The Last Remnant Developer Interview

Square Enix: There is no single word we can use to describe remnants at this point. Even within the development team, people have different understandings of what remnants mean to them. This is a very subtle example, but if you say water, it exists as naturally as you can imagine in one world. If you have one drop, it doesn't cause any disasters. But if you have too much, it causes floods. Remnants can be considered as being somewhat similar to water in our world.

Our expectation is that when people complete the game, the users will all have a different concept and understanding of the remnants.

GameSpy: Do you find it difficult internally to develop a new role-playing franchise within Square Enix, alongside such time-honored franchises like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy?

Square Enix: It is definitely a challenge to get the already established customers from other established IPs, including our own. But if it wasn't difficult, it wouldn't be worth trying.

GameSpy: The big announcement is that The Last Remnant is coming first to Xbox 360. Is this a marketing decision, or were you having trouble working on the PS3?

Square Enix: This is mainly for development reasons. We're developing the game using the middleware Unreal Engine, and the Unreal Engine has a slower development on the PS3 side. It was only really workable after Unreal Tournament was published, so this was mainly a development decision.

GameSpy: It's a myth that the Unreal Engine is just for shooters, but many believe that to be so. Why did you pick the Unreal Engine for development of your game, and what has development been like with it?

Square Enix: The Unreal Engine made it very easy to work with cut-scenes and such in the early phases of development, which you can't really work on if you're using your own technology. The difficulty has been in overcoming the differences in development culture between Square Enix and Epic. But it's been a good challenge, one that we've enjoyed.

GameSpy: Will you be using Unreal Engine in any possible sequels or other products?

Square Enix: We can't really say if we're going to go with Unreal Engine or Crystal Engine, or we could probably create our own engine from scratch when we're ready to make the next game. But we want to remind you that we don't start game development by picking an engine. It starts by creating the ideas, and then turning those into the game. We'll pick the engine that's most suitable for creating those ideas.

GameSpy: I've always been amused by how the original Final Fantasy was released, followed by many, many more Final Fantasy games, with no actual "final" game in sight. Do you feel like you've painted yourself into the same corner with the title of this game?

Square Enix: We hope that this is not the last, The Last Remnant! Do you know why we named the original game Final Fantasy?

GameSpy: Right, the company was going bankrupt at the time, and that would have been your last great RPG.